Johannes Baier (officer)

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Johannes Baier during the Nuremberg Trials . Photo taken in January 1947.

Johannes Heinrich Baier , known as Hans Baier (born November 4, 1893 in Geestemünde , † March 16, 1969 in Bremerhaven ) was a German lieutenant captain in the Navy , National Socialist and later SS Oberführer . Baier was charged during the Nuremberg Trials and convicted as a war criminal.

Life

The son of a master goldsmith graduated from the Reform Realgymnasium in Geestemünde in March 1912 and was initially an assistant at the Reich Finance Administration . 1912 was made the first contact with Oswald Pohl during his Navy time as paymaster -Anwärter (4th Company of the II. Shipyard division) in Wilhelmshaven . From April 1913 to July 1914 he took part in an assignment abroad in East Asia and Japan . From the beginning of the First World War he was employed as a paymaster in the Imperial Navy in various commands and at the end of the war he held the rank of lieutenant in the position of naval paymaster. After the end of the war, Baier was involved in the liquidation of the naval station in Kiel and was discharged from the navy at the end of March 1921. He also began studying economics, which he broke off in November 1921.

From the end of November 1921 to the end of November 1935, Baier worked in the Reich Finance Administration. At the tax offices in Göttingen , Geestemünde, which then merged in 1924 in the tax office of the city of Wesermünde and Bremerhaven , Baier was employed in the assessment as well as accounting and tax auditing. On May 1, 1933 , he became a member of the NSDAP ( membership number 2.572.143). In December 1935 he rejoined the Navy as a supplementary administrative officer candidate , whereupon he was dismissed in March 1937 as a lieutenant captain . He then moved to Munich . On August 1, 1937, he joined the SS (SS No. 279,458) and became SS-Hauptsturmführer. From April 1937 and August 1943 he was the head of the courses for administration studies at the SS Junkerschule in Bad Tölz - Dachau branch. As SS-Standartenführer he became in August 1943 head of the office group of commercial enterprises at the SS Economic and Administrative Main Office . In November 1943 he was promoted to SS-Oberführer . From August 1943 until the end of the war he was the managing director authorized to represent the company Deutsche Wirtschaftsbetriebe GmbH (DWB) in Berlin.

On May 6, 1945, he was arrested by members of the US Army and brought before an American military tribunal. In the SS Economic and Administrative Main Office trial he was sentenced on November 3, 1947 by the United States Military Tribunal II to ten years imprisonment for war crimes , crimes against humanity and membership in criminal organizations for his involvement in the forced labor of concentration camp inmates. He was pardoned and released early from the Landsberg War Crimes Prison in February 1951 .

Awards

literature

Web links

  • Institute for Contemporary History Munich-Berlin: Witness literature online. ZS 479, Baier, Hans (PDF file; 9.12 MB). Activity of the main economic administration office, in particular the office group W; Inmate work; Forced labor; Payment of prisoners; Conversion of forced labor camps into concentration camps; Expansion of the Wewelsburg to an Ordensburg for the SS; Abandonment of the Osti Society in Lublin; Jewish assets for the Osti society; Etc.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Walter Naasner (Ed.): SS-Wirtschaft und SS-Verwaltung , Düsseldorf 1998, p. 325f.
  2. ^ Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 25.
personal data
SURNAME Baier, Johannes
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Baier, Johannes Heinrich (full name); Baier, Hans
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lieutenant captain in the navy and later SS-Oberführer
DATE OF BIRTH November 4, 1893
PLACE OF BIRTH Geestemünde
DATE OF DEATH March 16, 1969
Place of death Bremerhaven