Otto Barnewald

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Otto Barnewald in April 1947

Otto Barnewald (born January 10, 1896 in Leipzig , † March 14, 1973 in Rheinhausen ) was a German SS-Sturmbannführer and as an administrative leader, head of the site administration of various concentration camps .

biography

Barnewald, whose father was a mechanical engineer, was employed by a bailiff from 1910 to 1913 after leaving school and then completed a commercial training. From 1913 he was a member of the Prussian Army and took part in the First World War as a soldier . After he was released from the army in 1919, Barnewald worked as an unskilled worker until 1922. Barnewald then worked as a commercial clerk and was unemployed from 1928 to 1933.

Barnewald joined the SA and the NSDAP ( membership number 149.640) in 1929. After joining the SS in 1931 (SS No. 6.469), he was a member of the SS disposal force from 1934 , where he worked in the administrative area. In the SS Barnewald rose to SS-Sturmbannführer in 1942. From 1938 he was administrative manager in the Mauthausen concentration camp and from 1940 in the same function in the Neuengamme concentration camp . In January 1942 Barnewald was transferred to the Buchenwald concentration camp , again as administrative manager, where he worked until April 11, 1945.

Barnewald's task in the administrative area was the procurement and distribution of food, clothing and necessities in the concentration camps Mauthausen, Arbeitsdorf, Neuengamme and Buchenwald. He was therefore partly responsible for the terrible situation of the prisoners in the camps.

At the end of the war, Barnewald was arrested and interned by members of the US Army in May 1945 . Barnewald was indicted before a US military court as part of the Dachau trials in the main Buchenwald trial , which took place between April 11, 1947 and August 14, 1947, along with 30 other accused. He was charged with having contributed to the catastrophic supply situation for the concentration camp inmates through the inadequate procurement and distribution of essential goods. He is also said to have repeatedly beaten prisoners with sticks or whips. A witness testified that he was supposed to have been present at the execution of prisoners of war. Barnewald denied the charges and merely confirmed that he had acted according to guidelines from Berlin.

The court regarded the burden of proof resulting from three years in the administration of the Buchenwald concentration camp as so serious that Barnewald was sentenced to death. A direct connection to the death of a prisoner could not be proven. Barnewald was sentenced to death by hanging , but the sentence was changed to life imprisonment in 1948. Barnewald was released from the Landsberg War Crimes Prison on June 28, 1954 and died in 1973.

literature

  • Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich: Who was what before and after 1945. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2005, ISBN 3-596-16048-0 .
  • Harry Stein, Buchenwald Memorial (ed.): Buchenwald Concentration Camp 1937 - 1945 , volume accompanying the permanent historical exhibition, Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 1999, ISBN 978-3-89244-222-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Harry Stein, Buchenwald Memorial (ed.): Buchenwald Concentration Camp 1937 - 1945 , volume accompanying the permanent historical exhibition, Göttingen 1999, p. 307
  2. ^ A b Ernst Klee: Das Personenlexikon zum Third Reich , Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 28.
personal data
SURNAME Barnewald, Otto
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German administrative leader in various concentration camps
DATE OF BIRTH January 10, 1896
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig
DATE OF DEATH March 14, 1973
Place of death Rheinhausen