Ludwig Sprauer

Ludwig Sprauer (born October 19, 1884 in Heidelberg , † June 24, 1962 in Achern ) was a German doctor and at the time of National Socialism the highest medical officer in Baden .

Life

Sprauer, son of the state railroad goods manager Karl August Sprauer, began his school days at an elementary school in Heidelberg. He then attended high schools in Durlach and Karlsruhe and passed the Abitur in 1902. After his school career, Sprauer studied medicine at the universities of Freiburg , Strasbourg and Berlin , which he graduated with a state examination in 1907. He was promoted to Dr. med. PhD . He then worked as an assistant doctor at the Heidelberg Children's Clinic, the Freiburg Deaconess House and the Wiesloch sanatorium . From 1910 to 1918 he worked as a general practitioner in Staufen im Breisgau . In 1919 he entered the civil service and was under the title of Medical Councilor until 1933 as a prison doctor at the state prison in Mannheim (1919-1920) and as a district doctor in Stockach (1920-1925), Oberkirch (1925-1930) and Konstanz (1930-1934) employed.

In the course of the transfer of power to the National Socialists , Sprauer became a member of the NSDAP on February 1, 1933 and was temporarily a city councilor in Konstanz, before he was entrusted in 1934 as the successor of Theodor Pakheiser with the management of the health department in the Baden Ministry of the Interior. Soon after taking office, he was promoted to senior medical officer. Sprauer was appointed government director in 1938 and later promoted to ministerial councilor. In this function he was the highest medical officer in Baden with his office in Karlsruhe .

Participation in the Nazi euthanasia

Sprauer was an advocate of the law to prevent hereditary offspring . In October 1939, Herbert Linden informed him about the planned T4 campaign and the associated registration of sick people on registration forms with reference to confidentiality, and he was obliged to cooperate. He was responsible for the administrative implementation of the “euthanasia” program in Baden. At the end of November 1939, the Baden Ministry of the Interior sent a decree to the heads of Baden institutions announcing the relocation of a “larger number” of inmates with a confidentiality note. After reviewing the registration forms, Sprauer authorized the transport lists of inmates destined for transfer to Nazi killing centers and initiated the appointment of the physician Arthur Schreck as T4 expert in February 1940. Schreck admitted during a post-war testimony that he had viewed a total of 15,000 registration forms and suggested 8,000 patients for killing. Between February and December 1940, at least 4,500 inmates of the Baden asylum were murdered in the Grafeneck Nazi killing center . After the end of the war, the chief medical officer Otto Mauthe testified that he was present with Sprauer, Linden und Stähle at the gassing of a woman transport and that everyone was watching. Sprauer also worked on the draft of the euthanasia law that had not come into force. From 1943 he carried the title of professor.

post war period

After the end of the war, Sprauer made an affidavit to Robert Kempner in Nuremberg on April 23, 1946, saying , among other things: "The incurable mentally ill should be disposed of for military policy reasons in order to make room". Sprauer finally had to answer together with the euthanasia doctor Arthur Schreck for crimes against humanity in unity with aiding and abetting murder before the jury of the regional court in Freiburg . The subject of the proceedings was participation in the Nazi euthanasia crimes in Baden due to appropriate administrative preparations, briefing of the facility manager , T4 expert activities, segregation of certain disabled people in the Nazi killing center in Grafeneck, management of a " children's department " and killing of children by Luminal . On November 16, 1948 Sprauer became a life sentence and terror to a life sentence plus ten years prison sentenced. After the revision , Schreck's sentence was reduced to twelve years and that of Sprauer was reduced to eleven years in prison. Both were credited with the fact that they were “not criminals in terms of their character disposition” and “would not have become a criminal in an orderly state. They both succumbed to the legal system of the National Socialist state ”.

Sprauer's sentence was suspended in 1951 by pardon . From July 1954 he received 450 DM as a monthly maintenance payment and in January 1955 the decision not to have to pay the court costs. A similar procedure was followed in the case of shock. Sprauer took up residence in Constance.

Web links

• Judgment of the Freiburg Regional Court against Sprauer in the Freiburg State Archives

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 : What they did - what they became. Doctors, lawyers and others involved in the murder of the sick or Jews . 12th edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2004, ISBN 3-596-24364-5 .
• Ernst Klee: "Euthanasia" in the Nazi state . 11th edition. Fischer-Taschenbuch, Frankfurt / M. 2004, ISBN 3-596-24326-2 .
• LG Freiburg i.Br., May 2, 1950 . In: Justice and Nazi crimes . Collection of German criminal judgments for Nazi homicidal crimes 1945–1966, Vol. VI, edited by Adelheid L. Rüter-Ehlermann, HH Fuchs, CF Rüter . Amsterdam: University Press, 1971, No. 211, pp. 477–541. Participation in the 'euthanasia program' in Baden through preparatory administrative measures , through instruction of the prison director, assessment of registration forms, selection of the mentally ill and their transfer to the Grafeneck killing center. Management of a 'children's department' and killing of 'Reichsausschusskinder' kept there by luminal injections

Individual evidence

1. ^ Fritz Bauer : Justice and Nazi Crimes: Collection of German criminal judgments for Nazi homicidal crimes 1945–1966 , Volume 6, p. 484.
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 592.
3. ^ "NS in Karlsruhe", entry Ludwig Sprauer , accessed on 23 August 2019
4. ↑ monocooltour SchwarzT: They live in their own zoo: Wisdom Therapy f. Patient Gesellschaft , 2012, p. 22.
5. ^ Peter Sandner: Management of the Sick Murder - The District Association Nassau in National Socialism , Gießen 2003, p. 742.
6. ↑ Quoted in: Peter Sander: Verwaltung des Krankenmordes - Der Bezirksverband Nassau im Nationalozialismus , Gießen 2003, p. 512. ( Memento of the original from October 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 1.8 MB) 
7. ↑ Euthanasia - Lists with red crosses . In: Der Spiegel , issue 20 of May 18, 1950, p. 8f.
8. ↑ Judicial and Nazi crimes ( Memento of the original from October 22, 2008 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. 
9. ↑ Ernst Klee: What they did - What they became. Doctors, lawyers and others involved in the murder of the sick or Jews. Frankfurt am Main 2004, p. 206 f., P. 90.