Eleonore Baur

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Eleonore Baur , née Mayr (born September 7, 1885 in Kirchdorf am Haunpold near Bad Aibling ; † May 18, 1981 in Oberhaching ), known as Sister Pia , was a fanatical German National Socialist from the very beginning and a personal friend of Adolf Hitler . In the Dachau concentration camp, Baur had the same privileges as an SS-Oberführer . In her private home in Deisenhofen near Oberhaching, an external unit of the Dachau concentration camp was temporarily used for forced labor.

biography

Life

Apart from sparse information, almost nothing is known about Baur's life up to 1919; much of the data is based on her own statements in judicial interrogations.

According to her own statement, Eleonore Baur had a difficult childhood. The mother died shortly after she was born, and her father remarried about six years later. She felt that she was being treated badly by her stepmother, she had to get up shortly after four in the morning every day to deliver milk in Munich. Until 1898 she attended elementary school for seven years and at the age of 14 had to take a job as a maid for a midwife on the day she left school . She hadn't learned a trade. Since the wages were low, she took odd jobs with private families and inns. Six years later, she went to Egypt with a nurse friend and was trained as a nurse in a German hospital.

In 1905, the same year, she gave birth to a son named Wilhelm. She handed this over to her stepmother's care before starting the journey. According to her, the father of the illegitimate son was a law student who had a fatal accident in 1938.

She stayed in Egypt for two years. Afterwards she worked as a private nurse in Munich and was given the name “Sister Pia” by the “Yellow Cross”, an association of nurses. In 1908 or 1909 she married the mechanical engineer Ludwig Baur. The "pure supply marriage" was divorced after five or six years. During this statement, Eleonore Baur could not remember the exact year. In a later interrogation by a judge, she stated that she had cared for sick people in her Munich apartment during the First World War . Up to this point nothing is known about political activity.

Her illegitimate son Wilhelm Baur (* 1905, † 1945) was adopted by her husband. He later made a career as head of the central publishing house of the NSDAP , vice-president of the Reichsschrifttumskammer and from 1934 head of the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels . He fell in 1945 during the Battle of Berlin .

Political career

In the spring of 1919, during the weeks of council rule in Munich , she set up an improvised rescue station for the wounded during the days of the fighting. According to her own statement, on February 19, 1920, she met civilians Anton Drexler and Adolf Hitler in the tram . She had run over her station and should pay more. Since she had no money with her, Drexler helpfully paid the amount for her. Through this incident she came into contact with "the movement", from then on attended meetings in the Sterneckerbräu and soon became a member of the DAP party (forerunner of the NSDAP ). Her membership number was 506, 511 or 559. It is not entirely clear whether her statement number 511 is correct. Hitler's ID card bears the number 555 and is dated January 1, 1920. In a later American questionnaire, Baur gave her number as 559. On March 11, 1920 there were demonstrations by women against the police on Theresienwiese. Baur happened to come by and shouted to the demonstrators not to abuse the police, but to insult those who were to blame for all the misfortune: "The Jews get eight pounds of wheat flour and one pound of sugar, and we don't give a shit." get something from the Jews that could even store food. Baur was charged with "inciting class hatred" and the court acquitted her. She had hounded against Jews in an irresponsible manner, but was far removed from calling on the crowd to commit acts of violence against the Jews and their property.

As a medic, she took part in the fighting of the Freikorps Oberland - a voluntary military association that was founded in 1919 in the context of the right-wing extremist Thule Society and newly founded in 1921 as the "Bund Oberland" and was part of the Hitler movement - in Silesia and was on May 21, 1921 Wounded thigh.

On November 9, 1923, she was actively involved in the Hitler-Ludendorff putsch - she supposedly marched in the fourth row - and was the first to rescue the wounded, as she later stated. Allegedly she protected Hitler with her body from being hit by bullets.

After the NSDAP was banned until it came to power in 1933, she said she no longer cared about politics. In 1923 she married for the second time, the ten years younger hotel manager Sponseil. The marriage ended in divorce in 1933. In the last few years of their marriage, she tried to market a skin oil; she had brought the recipe back from Egypt. A Hamburg pharmaceutical company bought the prescription for 10,000 RM . Himmler hired her in 1934 as a "welfare sister in the SS Reichsführung" with the privileges of an SS chief . Baur later boasted of her good contacts with the Reichsführer SS and called him "my black pearl". On November 8, 1934, Hitler awarded her the Order of Blood for her participation in the march on the Feldherrnhalle. At this award, Hitler asked her if she had a wish and allowed her to work as a nurse in the Dachau concentration camp .

The opinion circulated among the prisoners in the Dachau camp that she had the rank of SS-Oberführerin, since she had the special position in the camp of being able to enter and leave the Dachau concentration camp at any time and without being accompanied by guards . The SS guards had to report to her, the prisoners and the SS ranks had to greet her. She herself later denied that she was an SS-Oberführer, and there are no historical documents on this. She visited the camp in the uniform of the brown nurses, and had her SS chauffeur Rudolf Wirth take food from the camp kitchen, even during the barren war years , allegedly also for her two dogs. She took things like bedclothes and inmate linen from the stores. The staff didn't stop them. As a personal friend of Hitler, she had an influence on whether someone was promoted or transferred to the Eastern Front.

At Christmas she distributed small packages of cookies; it is not known whether she financed these herself. During her visits, she admonished the political prisoners to remain loyal to the Fiihrer, and taught them and verbally abused them. Hitler had given her a villa with a garden in Oberhaching. This was partly equipped with objects from the workshops of the Dachau concentration camp.

She had her own work detachment of two to four prisoners for the villa. She had a garage, a shed, a bathhouse and a bunker built. She promised one of the young inmates, Max Leopold, whom she liked even though he was Jewish, that he would be released for Christmas. But when he was released from the camp, he turned to the maid from the villa. Soon after, he died. Another detainee from her own work detail died similarly after not responding to her intrusiveness. He was allegedly "shot while trying to escape".

Legal proceedings

Baur was arrested on May 5, 1945 and released shortly afterwards. The US Army's Counter Intelligence Corps arrested her again on July 12. In August 1949, an investigation was opened against her for complicity in murder . Baur confessed to having participated in Rascher's attempts at hypothermia three times , which often ended fatally. The district court heard about 100 witnesses. The charge was largely based on Walter Neff's testimony that he himself encountered her twice trying. The doctors Holzlöhner and Finke had previously suggested that a light anesthetic be administered. She protested, interfered and supported Rascher. Rascher's experiments were then carried out without anesthesia. Finke is supposed to have said that she had no business here and that she then left the room. The 1st criminal division of the Munich Regional Court came to the conclusion that “the evidence for aiding and abetting a crime of murder, bodily harm resulting in death or dangerous bodily harm is insufficient”.

Irrespective of this, a second charge was brought against them under the “Law for Liberation from National Socialism and Militarism” as part of the denazification process . The main court heard 44 witnesses. A contradicting picture emerged from the statements. She said she did not commit any active crimes, but took advantage of the inmates' labor in her villa. She was an ardent National Socialist and anti-Semite and used her relationships with the highest party circles to frighten neighbors and acquaintances. A neighbor, Maria Hohenester, was denounced and put in pre-trial detention for seven weeks. Statements mostly described their character as unpredictable, moody, hysterical. One witness described how she to the malaria - experiments attended by Schilling. Another witness, Alois Siegl, described her as a “seldom noble and kind woman” because she put the Kapo Deiner, who had previously knocked Siegl down, in his place. In addition, in 1943 or 1944, she campaigned with Himmler to have SS camp leader Kampe replaced because he was too raw. This happened, but afterwards Himmler forbade her to enter the camp. The SS man Rudolf Wirth, who was assigned to her as a chauffeur from the end of February, confirms that she was no longer allowed to enter the camp from around 1943. He gave the reason that Baur had tried to smuggle out letters from female prisoners. Another witness stated that Baur had been with most of the SS leaders and that a picture of her hung in the cellar with the inscription “Sister Pia, our best SS man”. Her housekeeper, Carolina Neulein, reported that SS leaders were often visiting the house, the SS band also made music in some cases, and that Baur liked to say: “There is only one Friedrich the Great, there is only one Adolf Hitler, there is only one sister Pia. ”Most of the positive testimonies came from German and Austrian clergymen. They stated that through their position of power they had helped some prisoners, mostly pastors of German origin. She brought them bread and tried to get some released. Polish clergymen were excluded from this.

On August 26, 1949, as part of denazification, she was sentenced to ten years of forced labor, which was the severest punishment in the Denazification Act, as well as the loss of her civil rights and the confiscation of her property except for a remainder of 1,000 DM . She lay vocation one. The Appeals Chamber reduced the sentence on February 20, 1951 to eight years, which no longer had any consequences. Already in June 1950, eight months after the verdict, she had been released from prison for health reasons. She came back into possession of her villa. She later applied for POW compensation. It is not clear from the files whether this was granted.

Over thirty years later, she died in 1981 at the age of 95. In Munich Merkur an obituary of camaraderie appeared Freikorps Oberland / Bund Oberland with the saying " called your honor loyalty - was your life Germany". The advertisement was signed by Fridolin von Spaun on his behalf . On her grave cross in Deisenhofen was written: "Sister Pia, A Life for Germany".

Movies

  • Thomas Hausner: Hitler and the women. MDR broadcast on January 21, 2003.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h Hans Holzhaider: "Sister Pia". Beneficiary between victims and perpetrators. In: Dachauer Hefte. 10, perpetrators and victims. 1994.
  2. ^ Judicial interrogation on October 10, 1949, during internment in the Eichstätt labor camp.
  3. ↑ Hans Holzhaider: Nazi icon blood sister Pia. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. November 9, 2007.
  4. ↑ Popular industry errors ( Memento from December 4, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) buchmarkt.de
  5. ^ The heads of the Börsenverein (PDF; 36 kB) Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels
  6. ↑ A later press report: she heroically marched in the front line of the Freikorps in 1919 , took part in the assault on Munich, put bandages on many wounded until she was shot in the chest. In 1920 she had to defend herself “with her breast still bandaged” before the Munich People's Court against the charge of “inciting class hatred”. In: Berliner Illustrierte. Supplementary edition dated October 31, 1934.
  7. ^ Anton Joachimsthaler : Hitler's List. 2004, p. 56.
  8. ↑ Comité International de Dachau (ed.); Stanislav Zámečník: That was Dachau. Luxembourg 2002, p. 180.
  9. ↑ According to the statement of the SS man and chauffeur Rudolf Wirth, this sympathy was only one-sided.
  10. ^ Testimony of a prisoner about their Christmas speech, source: Weiler, p. 851 f, taken from: Comité International de Dachau (ed.); Stanislav Zámečník: That was Dachau. Luxembourg 2002, p. 181.
  11. ↑ DACHAU SUBCAMP MUNICH-SCHWABING [ALSO KNOWN AS SISTER PIA]. on the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum website
  12. ^ Report by H. Schwarz about Sister Pia, DA-15821. And "Sister Pia". A life for Germany? In: Frauenleben in Munich, reader on the history of everyday life in Munich. Munich 1993, pp. 125–130, sources taken from Zámečník: That was Dachau. Luxembourg 2002, p. 183.
  13. ↑ The Süddeutsche Zeitung reported on August 27, 1949 that their behavior towards the prisoners of their work detachment was "sometimes so low and disgusting that the Spruchkammer had to meet temporarily in camera."
  14. ↑ Press reports on the trial at: Süddeutsche Zeitung of August 18, 1949, Münchner Merkur of August 17, 1949. On her death: Spiegel No. 23/1981, Dachauer Archive DA-17365: Statement by former prisoner K. Röder on the question “ How bizarre was Sister Pia? "
  15. ↑ Illustration of the obituary formerly In: Hans Holzhaider: Nazi icon Blood sister Pia. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung. November 9, 2007.
personal data
SURNAME Baur, Eleanor
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Blood sister Pia; Angel of Dachau; Mayr, Eleonore (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German SS-Oberführerin in the Dachau concentration camp
DATE OF BIRTH September 7, 1885
PLACE OF BIRTH Kirchdorf near Bad Aibling
DATE OF DEATH May 18, 1981
Place of death Oberhaching