Josef Vonkennel

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Christoph Josef Vonkennel , born Christoph Joseph Vonkennel (born August 9, 1897 in Munich , †  June 13, 1963 in Cologne ) was a German dermatologist , university professor and SS leader.

Life

Vonkennel took part in the First World War as a soldier . After a hand grenade exploded , he lost his right leg on the Western Front in 1916 and has had a prosthetic leg ever since. After the end of the war Vonkennel joined the Bund Oberland . After completing his school career, Vonkennel began studying medicine at the University of Munich . Vonkennel was also politically active in ethnic groups during his time as a student in Munich . He took part in anti-Semitic riots against members of the Union of Students of the Jewish Faith and was sentenced to six days in prison for this.

Vonkennel completed his studies at the University of Munich in 1928 with a doctorate to become a Dr. med. The title of his dissertation , published in 1931, was Experimental and histochemical investigations into bismuth therapy .

time of the nationalsocialism

Vonkennel had been a member of the NSDAP since 1933 . He habilitated the end of December, 1934 in Munich in skin and venereal diseases and taught there after as a lecturer. From August 1937 Vonkennel took over the representation of a chair at the University of Kiel and worked there from March 1938 to spring 1943 as a full professor. He became Vice Rector in 1941. At the University of Kiel he was the National Socialist Lecturer Association and devoted himself to sulfonamide research. From 1937 to 1942 conducted research Vonkennel also with Josef Kimmig to chemotherapy of gonorrhea .

Vonkennel was a member of the security service of the Reichsführer SS (SD) and a member of the Schutzstaffel (SS). Vonkennel was promoted to SS-Sturmbannführer in the SS and became an advisory dermatologist for the SS Reichsarzt . The SD classified Vonkennel as a “fanatical National Socialist among the dermatologists in Europe” who was “ready for anyone at any time”. Vonkennel received support from the SD network in his appointment as a full professor of dermatology at the University of Leipzig. Before that, Vonkennel had entered into a contract with the Reich doctor SS Ernst-Robert Grawitz on January 15, 1943 - initiated by Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler - which was not made public. In this contract it was agreed that Vonkennel, supported by the SS-Wirtschafts- und Verwaltungshauptamt , should establish a chemotherapeutic research institute, which was housed in a university institute for camouflage purposes. Vonkennel should send the research results obtained there directly to Himmler. The background to this was Himmler's endeavor to have a German penicillin developed as quickly as possible, as the British had a head start in terms of penicillin research. In order to achieve this goal as quickly as possible, human experiments on concentration camp prisoners were contractually agreed. From April 1943 Vonkennel was a full professor at the University of Leipzig and headed the university skin clinic there and the research institute V (Vonkennel). Ten employees were employed in this research institute, financed by the SS company Deutsche Heilmittel GmbH . Among them was the physician Josef Kimmig. The developed sulfonamide preparation DDS (Diaminodiphenylsulfon) should finally be tested on humans:

“The connection in humans still has very unpleasant side effects (severe cystosis), but it should be considered whether one should not make a few orientating experiments with typhus patients in order to justify further work on detoxification. Can you arrange for us to work with a clinic? "

- Josef Vonkennel in a letter dated June 1, 1944 to the Reichsarzt SS

From the Buchenwald concentration camp , the camp doctor Erwin Ding-Schuler turned to Vonkennel conspiratorially so that the experiments could be carried out at the Buchenwald branch of the hygiene institute of the Waffen-SS - typhus and virus research department. In Buchenwald concentration camp prisoners who served as test subjects were burned to the skin by means of poison gas and then the effectiveness of Vonkennel's preparation was tested. During these experiments, prisoners also died as a result of the experiments. Vonkennel saved Kimmig's brother, a Catholic clergyman, from being sent to a concentration camp by hiring him as his chauffeur. A Jewish assistant was employed in his clinic. Vonkennel and his research group were able to isolate a penicillin for the first time in Germany in 1944. Vonkennel was still a member of the scientific advisory board of Karl Brandt's health care representative from 1944 and, according to Brandt, was the “leading dermatologist of the Nazi era”. In 1944 he became a member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina . At the end of January 1945 he was promoted to Obersturmführer in the Waffen SS . Albrecht Scholz counts Vonkennel as one of the "most important research personalities of the 3rd Reich", who, however, exceeded "ethical limits" through his knowledge of the human experiments in the Buchenwald concentration camp.

After the end of the war

Vonkennel was arrested and interned in April 1945 by members of the US Army . In the course of a court proceedings in Darmstadt , he was classified as exonerated in the context of denazification in 1948 . After his release from internment, Vonkennel became a specialist at the Chemical Works Rheinpreußen in Düsseldorf . The plan to appoint Vonkennel to the chair in Cologne met with concerns from dermatologists and university professors Alfred Marchionini , Otto Grütz and Alfred Stühmer , who issued corresponding statements because of his Nazi past . Nevertheless, Vonkennel was appointed by the University of Cologne and the responsible minister of education. From the beginning of May 1950 until his death Vonkennel was a full professor for skin and venereal diseases at the University of Cologne , where he headed the university skin clinic. In this function he promoted external research and nuclear medicine and the development of operative dermatology and dermatological cosmetics. In addition, he was a member of the Medical Advisory Board of the Federal Ministry of Labor for issues relating to the provision of war victims. The Cologne public prosecutor's office initiated investigations against Vonkennel based on the experiments in Buchenwald, which were discontinued after Vonkennel's suicide .

Vonkennel had been married to Waldtraut Sofia Elisabeth Vogelsang since 1943. He died at the age of 65 in Cologne-Lindenthal.

Honors

  • Award of the Schaudinn Hoffmann plaque by the German Dermatological Society (1963)

Fonts (selection)

  • Malaria treatment in the spring , Berlin 1927.
  • Experimental and histochemical studies on bismuth therapy , Berlin 1931.
  • For testing skin protection ointments containing silicone , Cologne 1958.

literature

  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich . Who was what before and after 1945 . 2nd Edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-16048-8 .
  • Ernst Klee: Auschwitz, Nazi medicine and its victims. 3. Edition. S. Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt am Main, 1997, ISBN 3-596-14906-1 .
  • Carsten Schreiber: Elite in the Secret - Ideology and Regional Rule Practice of the Security Service of the SS and its Network Using the Example of Saxony, Studies on Contemporary History , Volume 77, Oldenbourg Wissenschafts-Verlag GmbH, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-486-58543-8 .
  • Brita Leube: Life and work of the dermatologist Josef Vonkennel (1897–1963) with special consideration of his time in Leipzig , Leipzig 1998.
  • Albrecht Scholz: History of Dermatology in Germany. Springer, Berlin / Heidelberg 1999, ISBN 978-3-642-63623-3 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Death certificate no. 1501 from June 18, 1963, registry office Cologne Lindenthal. In: LAV NRW R civil status register. Retrieved June 20, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Carsten Schreiber: Elite in Hidden - Ideology and Regional Rule Practice of the Security Service of the SS and its Network Using the Example of Saxony , Munich 2008, p. 106.
  3. ↑ Carsten Schreiber: Elite in Hidden - Ideology and Regional Rule Practice of the Security Service of the SS and its Network Using the Example of Saxony , Munich 2008, p. 266.
  4. ↑ a b c d Josef Vonkennel in the professorial catalog of the University of Leipzig
  5. ↑ a b c d e f g h i Ernst Klee: The personal dictionary for the Third Reich. Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 645.
  6. ↑ Albrecht Scholz: History of Dermatology in Germany , Berlin / Heidelberg 1999, p. 145
  7. ↑ Entry in Peter Altmeyer's Encyclopedia of Dermatology: Vonkennel, Josef , Springer Verlag, (online) 2017. accessed on November 21, 2017
  8. ↑ a b c d e Carsten Schreiber: Elite in the Hidden - Ideology and Regional Rule Practice of the Security Service of the SS and its Network Using the Example of Saxony , Munich 2008, p. 264f.
  9. ↑ Quoted from: Carsten Schreiber: Elite im Verborgenen - Ideology and regional domination practice of the security service of the SS and its network based on the example of Saxony , Munich 2008, p. 265.
  10. ^ A b Albrecht Scholz: History of Dermatology in Germany , Berlin / Heidelberg 1999, p. 138
  11. ↑ Member entry of Josef Vonkennel at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on October 12, 2012.
  12. ↑ Albrecht Scholz: History of Dermatology in Germany , Berlin / Heidelberg 1999, p. 122
  13. ^ Albrecht Scholz: History of Dermatology in Germany , Berlin / Heidelberg 1999, p. 165
  14. ↑ Ernst Klee: Auschwitz, Nazi medicine and its victims. , Frankfurt am Main 1997, p. 335.
personal data
SURNAME Vonkennel, Josef
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Vonkennel, Christoph Josef (full name); Vonkennel, Christoph Joseph (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German dermatologist, university professor and SS leader
DATE OF BIRTH August 9, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH June 13, 1963
Place of death Cologne