On
this date, 28 May 1946, the Dachau Concentration Camp Commandant, Otto Förschner, was executed by hanging at Landsberg Prison. I will post
the information about this Nazi War Criminal from Wikipedia.
Otto Förschner in US custody, 1945
|
Born
|
4 November 1902
Dürrenzimmern, German Empire |
Died
|
28 May 1946 (aged 43)
Landsberg am Lech, Germany |
Allegiance
|
Weimar Republic (to 1933)
Nazi Germany |
Service/branch
|
Reichswehr (to 1934)
Schutzstaffel |
Rank
|
Sturmbannführer
|
Unit
|
5th SS Panzer Division Wiking
SS-Totenkopfverbände |
Battles/wars
|
Eastern Front (World War II)
German V-2 campaign |
Otto Förschner
(November 4, 1902 – May 28, 1946) was a German SS-Sturmbannführer and a Nazi
concentration camp officer. He served as commandant of the Mittelbau-Dora
concentration camp and the Dachau sub-camp of Kaufering.
Early
life
Förschner
was born in the town of Dürrenzimmern, Bavaria on November 4, 1902 and was
raised on a farm owned by his family. In 1922 he enlisted in the Reichswehr and
would remain a soldier for the next 12 years. Following his departure from the
army in 1934 he became a member of the SS and was assigned to its
military-wing, the SS-Verfugungstruppe, the organization that would eventually
become the Waffen-SS. Between April, 1934 and December, 1936 Förschner attended
the SS Officers School in Bad Tölz and became a member of the Nazi Party in
1937.
Concentration
camp officer
During
the German invasion of
the Soviet Union in 1941, Förschner served as an officer with the 5th SS
Panzer Division Wiking . After being wounded in action and declared
medically unfit for combat duty, he was transferred to the SS-Totenkopfverbände,
taking over as commander of the SS guard battalion at the Buchenwald
concentration camp in the spring of 1942.
In
September, 1943 Förschner was given command over the newly built concentration
camp of Mittelbau-Dora, which at this time functioned as a sub-camp of the much
larger Buchenwald. The purpose of Mittelbau-Dora was to provide slave-laborers
from among its inmate population to the nearby V-weapons production facility of
Mittelwerk. In addition to his position as commandant at Dora, Förschner was
also technically the managing director of Mittelwerk GmbH, the front company
created by the German government for V-weapons production. He would hold this
post until April,1944 when he was replaced by Georg Rickhey.
Förschner
had a contentious relationship with the various Nazi security services (the SD
and the Gestapo) that operated in and around Mittelbau-Dora. His leadership was
regularly criticized by them as being too “soft” on both the camp’s prisoners
and personnel. Of particular concern for them was Förschner’s practice of
selecting prisoner functionaries almost exclusively from among the camp’s German-Communist
inmates.
Förschner’s
reputation was badly damaged in November, 1944 when many of the prisoner
functionaries he had appointed were rounded up by the Gestapo and revealed to
have been involved in resistance
activities inside the camp, most notably, the sabotage of V-weapons
during the production process. After it was revealed that Förschner had failed
to report a bonus payment of 10,000 Reichmarks he had received from Mittelwerk
GmbH, he was dismissed as commander of Mittelbau-Dora in February, 1945 and
replaced by former Auschwitz commandant Richard Baer.
After
being relieved of command at Mittelbau-Dora, Förschner was transferred to Dachau,
where he served briefly as commandant of the sub-camp of Kaufering.
Post-war
In
April, 1945 Förschner was taken prisoner by the US Army. He was a defendant in
the Dachau concentration camp trial in which he was indicted for war crimes
stemming from his tenure at Kaufering. Namely, Förschner was charged with responsibility for the brutal conditions which prevailed in the camp and his role in the
management of prisoner executions.
He
was convicted by a US military tribunal and sentenced to death, along with 35
other co-defendants, on December 13, 1945. He was hanged in Landsberg prison on
May 28, 1946.
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