Walter Schmidt (doctor)

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Walter Eugen Schmidt (born July 9, 1910 in Wiesbaden ; † January 31, 1970 ibid) was SS-Untersturmführer in the National Socialist German Reich and as a senior physician in the Eichberg state hospital as part of the T4 campaign and the child “euthanasia ” involved in the killing of Involved in mentally ill and disabled children.

Origin and studies

Schmidt was born on July 9, 1910 in the Wiesbaden district of Sonnenberg, the son of the architect Karl Schmidt, where he grew up and graduated from high school. He studied medicine at the University of Frankfurt am Main from 1932 to 1937 .

Schmidt joined the Hitler Youth in 1927 and the NSDAP on December 26, 1930 , from which he resigned in April 1931 and returned as a member in May 1933. In March 1932 he became a member of the SS .

In 1937 Schmidt passed his state examination and received his doctorate the following year. He initially worked as a medical intern at the University Women's Clinic and the Medical University Clinic Frankfurt am Main as well as the Orthopedic Clinic Wiesbaden. In February 1939 he received his license to practice medicine retrospectively from December 1938.

In the Hadamar State Hospital

From February 15, 1939, Schmidt was employed as a volunteer doctor and from May 1, 1939 as an assistant doctor at the Hadamar State Hospital. Already here he is said to have personally killed patients with a syringe. There is evidence of a case in which Schmidt killed a patient suffering from paralysis with two scopolamine injections, although this was expressly forbidden by his superior.

With the Waffen SS

On May 22, 1939, Schmidt was transferred to the Eichberg state hospital as an assistant doctor at his own request, but was drafted into the later Waffen SS in August 1939 . There he was employed in an SS skull regiment in Brno , Danzig , Prague and from April 1940 to March 1941 in Norway . Before that, he also served briefly in the Dachau concentration camp and possibly in Buchenwald .

Head of the “children's department” at the Eichberg state hospital

After his assignment in Norway, Schmidt returned to the Eichberg state hospital on March 15, 1941. Here he took over the “ children's department ” established at the beginning of 1941 .

As part of the so-called child “euthanasia” , the commissioned “Reich Committee for the Scientific Assessment of Hereditary and Conventional Severe Sufferings” instructed children and later also adolescents with hereditary diseases and deformities in specially selected clinics for the supposed special care and clarification of scientific questions. Doctors and midwives were obliged to inform the "Reich Committee" of all cases with the symptoms mentioned. In fact, at least 5,000 infants, children and adolescents in the 30 or so children's departments across the country were killed by drugs or malnutrition .

Schmidt uk was placed in charge of the Eichberg children's department and on July 1, 1941, was promoted to senior physician .

In his testimony on December 3, 1946 in the Eichberg trial, Schmidt described the procedure of the Reich Committee as follows:

“We received so-called authorizations from Berlin. This authorization was given on the basis of reports issued by the medical officers , midwives , etc. [...] So in this way the Reich Committee covered all deformed people, idiots , Mongoloids , and cretinists . Approximately these forms were recorded and presented to a medical commission in Berlin on the basis of these registration forms. This medical commission decided that this child in question should be taken to some specialist department for treatment; the briefing concluded. With this briefing, a process arose. These processes were sent to us in Eichberg together with the authorization. We had to report every month. It was the authorization to carry out a treatment in the sense of euthanasia. In 95% of the cases it came with the child. […] In the other 5% it was the case that the child was registered with the Reich Committee, but for some reason the report was unclear, so that the children had to be assessed by us first. We had to make a purely medical report on these children. In these medical reports, the main question was: How do you rate the educational ability? A position had to be taken on this. "

If these reports contained an unfavorable prognosis, the “Reich Committee” authorized the killing of the child, which in clauses replaced the word killing with “treatment” and read, for example:

“With reference to your report of July 7th, 1941 about the above-mentioned child, I would now like to inform you that the child can be treated, provided that the clinical observation confirms the findings described. In due course, I would like to inform you about the result of the treatment. Heil Hitler . from Hegener "

Schmidt then reported the result of the "treatment", that is, the killing, to the "Reich Committee", for example with the child Helmut [...] who "found a sudden death on October 23, 41" [...] .

The children were killed by Schmidt himself and selected nursing staff. This was instructed accordingly by Schmidt during the evening round by stopping at the patient in question and saying: "I don't like it anymore."

In the Eichberg trial of 1946, Schmidt admitted the killing of 30 to 40 children. The head nurse Helene Schürg admitted the killing of 30 to 50 children. According to her, around 500 children were admitted to the children's department. Of the two-thirds who died there, one-third, i.e. around 200 children, was killed by injections with morphine- chloral hydrate and luminal tablets. The Eichberg staff therefore called Schmidt a "mass murderer" . A colleague rated him "as a shower head and a psychopath" .

At the Heidelberg Psychiatric and Neurological University Clinic , Schmidt sat in with Professor Carl Schneider , who trained doctors for brain sections in order to obtain the brains of deceased or killed patients for his research. For this purpose, the responsible state council of the Nassau district association, Fritz Bernotat , issued the following instruction:

"According to an agreement with the director of the Heidelberg University Psychiatric Clinic, Prof. Dr. Karl Schneider, with immediate effect, all brain specimens that arise during opductions in the institution there must be sent to the University Psychiatric Clinic in Heidelberg, Vosstrasse 4, for special experimental purposes. In particular, the brains of deceased feeble-minded people , epileptics and post- cephalitism should be sent in. In any case, the opduction must therefore be carried out on these patients after their death. "

In his interrogation by the Frankfurt am Main public prosecutor's office on November 12, 1946, Schmidt said:

"During my work at the Schneider'sche Klinik in Heidelberg, I devoted myself to work on brain histology which was only loosely related to the first-mentioned research purpose [meaning the shock therapy methods that were newly emerging at the time, such as insulin and cardiazole shock]."

A patient named Ballast, who served Schmidt as an assistant, gave him a photo album at Christmas 1941, in which the picture of a child was combined with the picture of the brain that Schmidt had dissected. This patient was also later injected to death by Schmidt. A total of at least 86 brains were sent to Heidelberg from the Eichberg facility.

The killing of the so-called "Reich Committee children" was not affected by the halt in the first phase of adult "euthanasia", but continued until the end of the war.

Shock treatments

From around the summer of 1942, Schmidt acquired a Siemens convulsator and began to experiment with the most varied forms of shock treatment, such as insulin shock , cardiazole shock , azo shock and electric shock . He portrayed the success of these measures in an exaggeratedly positive manner. In his trial after the war he tried to put these healing efforts in the foreground of his work on the Eichberg and thus to play down the killings in the children's department.

Action T4

In the post-war parlance " Aktion T4 " and in National Socialist jargon euphemistically known as "euthanasia" in special gas killing centers, the Eichberg State Sanatorium acted as an "intermediate institution". These served to camouflage the action in that the death row inmates were not transferred directly to the killing centers, but initially to institutions that were close to one of the five gas murder centers. In addition, the "buffer function" of the intermediate facilities ensured optimal and continuous use of the killing facilities, thus avoiding "idle times" or "overloads".

Eichberger patients were first transferred to the Hadamar Nazi killing center on January 13, 1941. Those responsible from Eichberg had sent a total of 800 of their own patients to their death in Hadamar by the end of April. After that, until the first phase of adult “euthanasia” stopped in August 1941, almost 1,500 patients followed, who had been transferred to Eichberg as one of the intermediate institutions for Hadamar.

As a representative of the institution director Friedrich Mennecke , Schmidt was also involved in these processes in a responsible position. Together with Mennecke and the directors of the Herborn , Weilmünster and Kalmenhof / Idstein institutions, he took part in a conference in Berlin in the spring of 1941, which was organized by the T4 organizers to discuss details of the transfer of patients to the intermediate institutions . From September 2, 1940 to December 1940, he worked as a T4 expert .

After the official stop of adult "euthanasia" in August 1941, the killing of the sick continued in a different form. Instead of being killed in several central gas killing centers, the patients were now killed locally in a large number of institutions and clinics through deliberate malnutrition and medication.

Obviously, targeted malnutrition was preferred on the Eichberg from summer 1941 to summer 1942. Thereafter, drugs were used to kill drugs with morphine , luminal and trional . The lethal dose was stretched over several days in such a way that the appearance of natural death was created. If relatives became suspicious and complained anyway, Schmidt threatened them with the Gestapo or with the complainant's mental state being compulsorily examined by a public health officer .

In addition to the killings as part of adult “euthanasia”, foreign forced laborers were also put to death on the Eichberg . In the post-war trial, a doctor from Eichberg testified:

“Every now and then we got sick Eastern workers admitted. Some of them came to the sick department, where I examined them and looked after and treated like all other mentally ill patients. But it also happened occasionally that I never saw these mentally ill Eastern workers. Dr. Schmidt stated - I don't know whether spontaneously or in response to a question from me - that we had a special department for mentally ill Eastern workers that was none of my business. From the whole situation and also from statements by the head nurse, I had to conclude that the lives of these sick women had been prematurely ended by an operation, if not by Dr. Schmidt's own hand, at least through his orders. One day I had a discussion with Dr. Schmidt [...]. He [...] firmly took the opinion that there was no place in Germany for insane foreigners , especially Russians , and that he would act as a soldier if he drew the conclusions from it. "

Overall, it can be stated that the death rate with an average occupancy of 1000 to 1500 patients per year was extremely high with around 600 to 800 deaths.

In Hadamar, too, after the gas murders stopped and the corresponding facilities were dismantled, people started killing patients through malnutrition and drugs. There this type of sick killing was carried out even more intensively than in other institutions. Between 1942 and 1945 around 700 patients were transferred from Eichberg to Hadamar. Over 95% of those displaced died there. Eichberg was thus under Schmidt, who, as Mennecke's deputy, became the de facto head of the institution after he had been drafted into the Wehrmacht in January 1943, the “gateway to death”.

In 1943/44, Schmidt succeeded Mennecke as head of the NSDAP local group in Eichberg-Eberbach. On January 1, 1944, he was appointed Provincial Medical Council. In March 1945 he destroyed all correspondence with the “Reich Committee” to prevent this incriminating material from falling into the hands of the Allies .

After the war

Schmidt was arrested by the Allies on July 12, 1945 and held in the Dachau internment camp from September 23, 1945 .

In the Eichberg trial before the 4th criminal chamber of the Frankfurt am Main regional court , Schmidt was sentenced to life imprisonment on December 21, 1946 . On August 12, 1947, the penalty due to a requested by the prosecution was this appeal from the Higher Regional Court of Frankfurt am Main in the death penalty changed, but returned on 12 January 1949 grace way back to a life imprisonment. In 1951 Schmidt was pardoned for ten years in prison, which he spent in Butzbach prison. A support campaign initiated by his parents contributed to his being released on parole in July 1953. 554 Wiesbaden residents had signed a list of signatures in which the doctor thanked for his new healing methods and declared him an opponent of euthanasia - the government of the state of Hesse bowed to public pressure.

The Hessian Prime Minister and Minister of Justice Georg August Zinn justified this practice of grace towards the Society for Christian-Jewish Cooperation : Acting federal and state ministers would have advocated Schmidt's release. In addition, the case law outside Hesse was much milder in similar cases. The prosecution seemed over. Despite revoking his license to practice medicine, Schmidt then returned to work as a doctor.

In the Nuremberg doctors' trial from December 9, 1946 to July 20, 1947, Schmidt appeared as a witness for the prosecution. He also testified about a meeting convened by the T4 organization, which he had attended in Berlin with his institution director Mennecke at the beginning of February 1940. Obviously he interrupted his military service in an SS-Totenkopf-Regiment for this :

"... the gentlemen lawyers in Berlin told us that it constitutes in this task to a legal matter, that there is a law of Hitler was, or a law-powerful decree - legally binding decree; the question of whether Hitler is authorized to issue such decrees was discussed by lawyers and was answered in the affirmative - and we were told that it was a matter that was definitely a legal state task that had been planned as early as 1932 and It was planned in other countries as well, and that we would in no way make ourselves liable to prosecution and, on the contrary, that sabotage of this Führer order would be punishable. The question of secrecy was also discussed in detail. It was said that this type of law was a new kind of law, that the patient should not be aware of such a measure beforehand, otherwise they might be excited, and that this was probably the main reason why this law was not published. Besides, we were at war at the time, so such measures should be kept secret inside. [...] that they would be incurably seriously ill, but it wasn't quite clear to me where the limit should be. "

Walter Schmidt died on January 31, 1970 in Wiesbaden.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden , Department 461 No. 32061, Volume 3, Sheet 107, Franz M. Frankfurt a. M. (formerly in the office of Hadamar State Hospital) to Police President Frankfurt a. M. on June 15, 1946, quoted from “Wissen und erren”, pages 181 and 210.
  2. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 461 No. 32442, Volume 4, W. Schmidt an Mennecke (December 23, 1941), quoted from "Wissen und erren" pages 210 and 211 and "Verwaltung des Krankenmordes" page 741.
  3. ^ “Knowledge and error”, pages 223/224.
  4. ↑ “Knowing and Err,” p. 224.
  5. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 430/1 No. 11170, medical record, quoted from “Wissen und erren”, pages 225 and 240, note 18.
  6. ↑ Alice Platen-Hallermund: “The killing of the mentally ill in Germany. From the German Medical Commission at the American Military Court ”, Frankfurt 1948, page 96 and Klee“ 'Euthanasia' in the Nazi state ”, page 435.
  7. ↑ “Medicine without humanity”, page 210.
  8. ^ Statement by the nurse Müller from July 27, 1945: "We just called him the 'mass murderer'" , Eichberg case Az .: 4 a Js 13/46 Public Prosecutor Frankfurt a. M., quoted from Klee “What they did - what they became” page 327.
  9. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 461 No. 32442, Volume 1, Sheet 43, Interview with Dr. med. Josef L. on August 2, 1945, quoted from “Administration of the Sick Murder”, page 536.
  10. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 461 No. 32442, Volume 13, Sheet 12, quoted from “Wissen und irren”, pages 233 and 242.
  11. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 461 No. 32442, Volume 3, quoted from “Wissen und erren”, page 242, note 60.
  12. ^ Klee “Documents on 'Euthanasia'”, page 251.
  13. ↑ “Knowledge and error”, page 194.
  14. ^ “Knowledge and error”, pages 197 and 216.
  15. ↑ Klee “'Euthanasia' in the Nazi State”, page 439.
  16. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 461 No. 33442 pages 20 and 21, quoted from "Ausonderung und Tod" pages 139 and 140.
  17. ↑ Of the total of 4,921 sick people who were transferred to Hadamar from January 1, 1942 to April 1, 1945, 4,418 died; this corresponds to around 90% ( Heinz Faulstich : "Hungersterben in der Psychiatrie 1914-1949", Freiburg i.Br. 1998, page 544, table 151).
  18. ↑ “Knowledge and error”, page 198.
  19. ↑ Main State Archives Wiesbaden, Department 461 No. 32442, Volume 1, Pages 18 - 25, quoted from “Verwaltung des Krankenmordes”, page 537.
  20. ↑ The headline of the weekly “ 7 Tage ” on August 1, 1952: “Thousands are dying! Terminally ill await the release of Dr. Schmidts ” ,“ Relocated to Hadamar ”pages 176 to 178.
  21. ^ Till Bastian : Terrible Doctors - Medical Crimes in the Third Reich. ISBN 3-406-39213-X , p. 60.
  22. ↑ Report by the President of the State Parliament on the symposium on the state government's answer to the major question from the Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen parliamentary group regarding persecution and extermination by the Nazi regime in Hesse, printed matter 15/1001, February 7, 2000.
  23. ↑ Angelika Ebbinghaus / Klaus Dörner (eds.): “Destroying and healing. The Nuremberg Medical Trial and its Consequences ”, page 619, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-7466-8095-6 .
  24. ^ Protocol of the Nuremberg Medical Trial, page 1858, quoted from "Medicine without Humanity", page 186.
personal data
SURNAME Schmidt, Walter
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Schmidt, Walter Eugen (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German doctor involved in the killing of mentally ill and handicapped children
DATE OF BIRTH July 9, 1910
PLACE OF BIRTH Wiesbaden
DATE OF DEATH January 31, 1970
Place of death Wiesbaden